Harpies in popular culture
The familiar figures of harpies, with their composite form, opportunity to display a female unclad torso, and violent nature, are much employed in video games and other products of market-directed culture. Fiction and Literature *In Hubert Selby Jr's 1956 cult classic, Last Exit to Brooklyn, wherein Harry is tortured in a dream by harpies who dismember him in the "Strike" section. *Harpies appear in Dante's Divine Comedy, in Canto XIII of the Inferno, where they hound suicides. *Harpies appear in Anne Bishop's The Black Jewels trilogy, where they are Demon-dead women who have died violently at the hands of a man. The queen of the harpies, Titiana, resides in Hell with her coven and her death-hounds who torture and feed on the men who forced them to their premature deaths. *In William Shakespeare's The Tempest, the spirit Ariel disguises itself as a harpy to deliver a message of its master, Prospero. *In The Amber Spyglass, harpies are the guardians of the underworld. *In The Secret of Platform 13, harpies are sent to retrieve the prince. *In the book series Xanth, harpies are often encountered by the characters. *In the Harry Potter series, Harpies are the mascot of an all female Quidditch team from Holyhead. Ginny Weasley (Potter) plays for this team when she grows up. * Harpies also appear in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at two notable times: when Aslan is killed on the Stone Table and the First Battle of Beruna. * Creatures which appear to be the basis for the harpy myth appear in the Solomon Kane story Wings in the Night by Robert E. Howard wherein, after having been driven from the shores of the Mediterranean, they have come to terrorise a village in Africa. * In L. Jagi Lamplighter's Prospero in Hell, Miranda, Mab, and Mephisto encounter harpies while leaving the North Pole. *Harpies also appear in the The Amber Spyglass from the Golden Compass series. Film * The three harpies appear in Popeye back in the 1930s. * In the 1935 film Barbary Coast, Joel McCrea's character says he hopes the Harpies "will not steal his gold" in reference to the games of chance, thieves and prostitutes. *In the film The Last Unicorn, a harpy, captured by Mommy Fortuna, resembles a giant vulture with three breasts. The harpy's name is Celaeno, "The Darkness", a lesser known harpy of Greek mythology. The film is based on the novel The Last Unicorn by award winning fantasy author Peter S. Beagle, which features a more traditional harpy. *In Spirited Away, Yubaba owns a harpy which is later turned into a hummingbird. *Fans of Neon Genesis Evangelion generally refer to the vicious, bird-like MP Evas that appear in End of Evangelion as Harpies. *In the Walt Disney film Fantasia, harpies are among the demons featured in the segment, "A Night on Bald Mountain". * In the 1963 film version of Jason and the Argonauts, the character Phineas is tormented by Gargoyle-like Harpies as punishment by Zeus for misusing his gifts of prophecy. *Harpya is a short Belgian animated film written and directed in 1979 by Raoul Servais, which won the Palme d'Or for Best Short Film at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival. Television *In the TV show Charmed, harpies are powerful female demons. The ones seen have dark skin and are dressed in black with long black talon like finger nails. They have super-strength and can shoot small energy blasts from their hands. *In the animated series She-Ra: Princess of Power, harpies are an evil race of beings who live in a dark area of Etheria called Talon Mountain. They are led by a harpy named Hunga. *In an episode of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys called "Beanstalks and Bad Eggs", three harpies hatch out of golden eggs. *In Xena: Warrior Princess, harpies appear in the episode "Mortal Beloved". They guard the castle where Hades is trapped. *In The Adventures of Sinbad TV series, harpies are frequent monsters that appear throughout the series. Some usually are under the employment of the evil sorcerer Turok and his daughter Rumina. *In the Super Sentai series Mahou Sentai Magiranger and its counterpart from the Power Rangers series Power Rangers: Mystic Force there is a harpy based monster named Hades Beastwoman Peewee Harpy who is known in Mystic Force as Screamer. *In The Simpsons episode, "War of the Simpsons", by John Swartzwelder, at the marriage retreat, a British man and his wife are arguing and he claims that his wife is "Queen of the Harpies!" *In Hellboy: Blood and Iron, two harpies are instruments in the summoning of the Greek goddess Hecate. *In the cartoon series The Batman, the super-villain Maxie Zeus refers to his aircraft as Harpies. *In an episode of The Fairly Oddparents, where Jorgen Von Strangle improvises the story of Timmy the Barbarian, one of the monsters he has him encounter is "The Harpy of Mt. Pain," a.k.a. the evil baby-sitter Vicky. *In an episode of DuckTales, a harpy falls in love with Launchpad McQuack. *In the science fiction TV series Demons, a 1000 year old harpy hunts down young men. It looks and behaves like a fire breathing Dragon Comics and Manga *In Masami Kurumada's manga Saint Seiya, an antagonistic character called Harpy Valentine appears as a servant of Hades. His Surplice dark armor is shaped as a harpy. *In the comic book story "The Golden Fleecing" by Carl Barks, they are called "larkies" instead of harpies (the term harpy was deemed an offensive term for homeless people by the Disney editors). *In the Manga Series One Piece Monet is a harpy character that appears in the Punk Hazard Arc with the ability to turn her body into snow. Games *In Puyo Puyo, Harpy (Puyo Puyo) is a singing angel. *In Shantae, the titular half-genie can transform into a harpy to fly around the area maps. *In the Playstation video game Suikoden II, harpies are encountered towards the middle of the game as semi-weak enemies. *In many fantasy role-playing games, such as Dungeons & Dragons and Fighting Fantasy, harpies are relatives — or maybe even the same species under another name — of the Sirens, and consequently possess the ability to hypnotize their victims by singing. *A harpy guards the area above the volcano in the 8-bit computer game Magicland Dizzy. *Harpy is Monster in My Pocket #21. In the video game, they appear in threes at the stage 4 construction site. *In Warcraft III, the expansion, and World of Warcraft the harpies are a fierce and barbarous race of magically-altered elves living in tribes. See also Harpies at the Warcraft race page. *In the Internet game Gladiatus, harpies are killable monsters. *In the MMOG EVE Online, the Harpy is an Assault Frigate for the Caldari race, designed as a very powerful long range railgun platform with strong defenses. *In the Yu-Gi-Oh! trading card game, there is a set of attractive harpy monsters known as "Harpie Lady", which originated from Mai Valentine's deck in the manga and anime. *In the God of War series, the harpies are a small, frequently encountered enemy, and servants of Ares. They have bat-like wings and attack by pecking at the player or turning into a firebomb and falling on top of him. The harpies also frequently utter a shrill shrieking sound. *In Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun, the Harpy is a light helicopter used by the Brotherhood of Nod. *In the PC game, Guild Wars Nightfall, the Skree are race of bird-people based on the harpies. *In the PC game, Titan Quest, harpies are one of a number of monster types encountered while adventuring in Greece. *In the Castlevania series of games (most notably Symphony of the Night and later installments following that games formula), Harpies often appear as enemies, usually in the Clock Tower area of the game. *In the Serious Sam series of PC and console games, the Scythian Witch-Harpy appears throughout various stages of the game as a standard airborne enemy creature that slash and have a projectile attack. *In the PC game King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder!, King Graham encounters harpies on an island en route to Mordack's castle. These harpies are blue with bat-like wings, red hair, and sharp teeth. Graham escapes being eaten by them when he plays a lyre (hence the reason why they are called "harp-ies"), the creatures change their minds and instead fight over the instrument. *In Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, harpies were enemies in the Alexandria levels Pharos Temple of Isis & Cleopatra's palace, They could perform two kinds of attacks. They can either fire energy bolts at Lara Croft or attack her with their talons. *In Vampire: The Masquerade, harpies are the keepers of the Social Order in the sect known as the Camarilla. They are the rumor mongers and keep track of status. They rival Elders in social power. *In the computer game Cythera, harpies are smallish, greyish white, manta-ray-like magical creatures that have the ability to make the MPC lose control. *In the MMORPG RuneScape, harpies are found as Harpie Bug Swarms, a Slayer monster found on the island of Karamja. *In the Final Fantasy, Breath of Fire, Tales, and Mana series of video games, harpies are encountered in battle. *In The Shadow Thieves Philonecron chains Mr. Metos to a cliff and sends harpies on him. *In the MMORPG LastChaos, harpies are a frequently found enemy in the game world of Dratan. *In the RPG/RTS hybrid SpellForce 2: Shadow Wars, harpies are enemy flying units. *In The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, the Ooccoo resemble harpies, however with a much more helpful temperament. *In the computer game Total Annihilation: Kingdoms, harpies are creatures of Zhon which take control of enemy units. *In the Sega CD game Dark Wizard, lesser harpies are summonable units. *In the Mega Man Zero Series of games, there are 4 reploids designed after X. One of them is Sage Harpuia, designed after a harpy and given the task of cleaning the skies. Though male, he is rather feminine in design. *Harpies are recruitable units available to the Dungeon race in Heroes of Might and Magic III. *Harpies are low level monsters that can be fought in specific regions of the MMORPG Ragnarok Online. *Harpies are a rare and occasionally dangerous creature found in evil lands in Slaves to Armok II: Dwarf Fortress Multi-media Franchise *The Digimon Harpymon is based on a harpy. In the game Tales of Phantasia. Harpy is one type of enemy Other *A trademarked rendition of a Harpy is used as the center patch found on the back of the colors worn by the Pennsylvania based motorcycle club Warlocks Motorcycle Club. Category:Topics in popular culture Category:Greco-Roman mythology in popular culture